Cruise missiles reportedly cost $1.59 million each, and your president, who claims we don’t have enough money to fund health care, education or Meals on Wheels, just launched 50 of them at once at a Syrian military airfield Thursday.

This is the first direct U.S. assault on the government of President Bashar Assad since Syria’s civil war began six years ago, and the Washington Post reports that the Trump administration authorized the operation as retaliation for a chemical attack that killed civilians earlier this week. As the Post notes, U.S. military involvement in Syria exposes the United States to a greater risk of confrontation with Russia and Iran, both of whom have backed Assad in his attempt to get rid of his opposition.

In a televised announcement made from his vacation home in Florida, Donald Trump said the strike was in the “vital national security interest” of the United States, and he called on “all civilized nations to join us in seeking to end the slaughter and bloodshed in Syria, and also to end terrorism of all kinds and types.”

“We ask for God’s wisdom as we face the challenge of our very troubled world,” Trump said. “We pray for the lives of the wounded and for the souls of those who have passed, and we hope that as long as America stands for justice then peace and harmony will in the end prevail.”

You read that correctly. Your president did not want Syrian refugees in our country, but he cares so much for them as they endure another crisis in their own country.

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From the Washington Post:

The missiles were launched from two Navy destroyers—the USS Ross and USS Porter—in the eastern Mediterranean. They struck an airbase called Shayrat in Homs province, which is the site from which the planes that conducted the chemical attack in Idlib are believed to have originated. The targets included the runway as well as aircraft, hangars and fuel.

And then:

The attack may put hundreds of American troops now stationed in Syria in greater danger. They are advising local forces in advance of a major assault on the Syrian city of Raqqa, the Islamic State’s de facto capital.

The decision to strike follows 48 hours of intense deliberations by U.S. officials, and represents a significant break with the previous administration’s reluctance to wade militarily into the Syrian civil war and shift any focus from the campaign against the Islamic State.

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Sens. John McCain (R-Ariz.), chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, and Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) said in a joint statement that the operation “sent an important message the United States will no longer stand idly by as Assad, aided and abetted by Putin’s Russia, slaughters innocent Syrians with chemical weapons and barrel bombs.”

The Post reports that they also called on the administration to take out Assad’s air force, and follow “through with a new, comprehensive strategy in coordination with our allies and partners to end the conflict in Syria.”